Sunday, April 12, 2015

The Call

Having just prepared this for re-posting elsewhere, I've realized this story of my long ago "re-conversion" has apparently never been shared on this blog.

I think it's about time it were....

It was as insistent, sometimes, as a telephone ringing. A persistent
"come… come… come" that I couldn’t quite ignore. Walking by the stairs
leading up to the chapel of my high school, I almost always sensed that
pull. I imagined I felt the way steel might in the presence of a strong
magnet. Only, steel would not try to pull away as I often did.

I was eighteen. The year before, rather quietly, God had begun to make
Himself real to me, and I found I wanted to grow closer to Him. So I
had left public high school for a Catholic girls’ academy taught by
semi-cloistered nuns. In this place of peace and stillness a path was
cleared for the Lord’s gentle voice to get through to me. At first I
stopped long enough to listen. But as the school year progressed, I
became more and more afraid of what the Lord was actually calling me to
do.

This concern was particularly striking one day when my Speech teacher stopped me after class.

"I had a little dream about you last night," Sister said with a gentle smile. "I dreamed you joined our Order here…"

I was suddenly aware of a hammering in my chest and ears, and of heat
rising in my cheeks. I think I managed to murmur something halfway
coherent as I hurried away, wondering "what is God trying to tell me?
Was that merely an idle dream that Sister thought I’d find amusing?" Or
was it something else. Everyone I’d known who appeared to really love
the Lord seemed to be in a convent or serving as a priest. Surely God
didn’t call anyone as I’d felt Him calling me unless it was to be a
Religious.

I had something different in mind for my life. A husband, children, and
perhaps a career in the Arts - these were my goals. Becoming a nun
wasn’t exactly on my itinerary. I wanted to serve God, but what if He
asked for what I then considered the ultimate sacrifice?

I dealt with this the only way I thought possible. I began to ignore
the "nudges." This was not hard to do, for there were so many things to
interest an active eighteen year old girl. It didn’t take long at all
before it seemed any sense of a "call" was gone.

Perhaps I felt relief when seeds of unbelief were planted during my
college years. After all, if God wasn't there, I wouldn't have to
concern myself with what He did or did not ask of me. I didn’t believe
or dis-believe at that point; I merely developed a rather convenient
"God doesn’t bother me and I don’t bother Him" philosophy. The only
trouble was that God did bother me, more than I dared admit to
myself. My attendance at Sunday Mass drifted from "regular" to
"occasional," and I stopped praying altogether. Yet God still had a way
of popping into my mind at unexpected times.

At twenty one, I began to feel a renewed interest in faith and went back
to attending Mass on a weekly basis. I even made attempts at prayer. I
became involved in the activities of the Catholic student center at my
University, and it was there that I met the young man I married. For
years after our wedding I considered myself a good Catholic. I never
missed Mass on Sunday, I was free of mortal sin, so I figured I was
pretty well off.

God was totally unreal to me, however. I prayed only rarely, and spent
much of my spare time reading books on secular philosophy and pop
psychology and "the meaning of life" (those basically making a case for
life having no meaning whatsoever). Seeds of unbelief sown years
earlier thus found a medium for growth.

I don’t know when it first dawned on me that I no longer believed in God
at all, but in order to keep from shaking my husband, I kept quiet
about it. My family had no idea that I sat at Mass Sunday after Sunday
wondering "how educated people could believe all this."

And then something happened. Now, many years later, I can only look
upon this sudden occurrence as a breakthrough of the grace of God.

To my surprise, I prayed my first prayer in years. I was somehow nudged to say, aloud, "God, I don’t believe in you, but if you’re real, and if you can hear me, I’m asking you to show me once and for all who or what
you are." And I told him that if he did this, I would follow him -
whatever he was.

I felt utterly absurd, as if I'd just spoken to the air. But I did have a sense that something had begun.

It was a sporadic beginning. I started reading everything I could find
about great religious of the world. Christianity? Yes, that too - but
only in an encyclopedia. After all, I’d been raised in Catholic schools
- I figured I knew all there was to know about that one. As far as what I was finding in my many other books... it seemed I just kept hitting brick walls.

A few weeks after that first prayer, however, I happened to spot a Bible
on my bookshelf. It occurred to me that this particular title had been
a bestseller for quite a few years, and I had never even read it. A
major literary lapse! I should at least pick it up and have a look.
After all, what could it hurt…?

I opened to the gospel of Matthew and began to read.

Several days later, I had read through to the gospel of John. I don’t
know if my mind grasped a thing, but some part of me seemed to somehow
be "absorbing."

I
read in stolen moments. And then the most surprising thing happened. I
found that rather than merely reading a nice historical account, I was
in fact meeting someone. It was as though He stepped right out of the
pages, out through the thees and thous of the translation, and in some
un-voiced way spoke to me.

The sense was of a voice I knew from sometime long ago, saying "come… come… come…"

This time I said yes.

I told Him I didn’t really understand what was happening to me. I had
no idea how I could have come to believe it. I only knew that Jesus
Christ was right there, in the room with me. I knew I believed in Him, I
knew I loved Him. I was willing to follow Him anywhere.

Things changed after that, certainly. I wanted to pray, I wanted to
read the Bible, I wanted to love God and everyone around me. I wanted
to meet others who loved Jesus as I did, so I prayed to be led to
them.... and I was.

In time, one of these new friends was asked to provide music for a
meeting in a town not far away. As it "happened," this was scheduled to
take place at the convent/monastery where I’d gone to high school. My
friend asked me to go with her. I considered this invitation for
awhile before giving a response.

I had never been one of those who went back to visit the Sisters after
graduation. By now, I felt nervous at the very thought of returning.
But with my chest and ears hammering, I told my friend yes.

We walked in the door right beside the stairs leading up to the chapel.
I literally gasped at the still-familiar sight. It was just as I’d
remembered. The banisters with their warm patina were just the same, as
were the creaky wooden floors. Even though the Sisters were not
teaching school there anymore, I half expected a young girl in uniform
blazer and regulation saddle shoes to tiptoe down the hall at any
moment.

We gathered in what had been the students’ refectory for the meeting.
Sisters filed in quietly, and I was busy searching their faces for one I
could recognize. Nope: not even one.

Before long, the laypersons and nuns assembled into small groups. In
mine, there was one Sister who seemed too young to have been here when I
was a student. So why was I feeling a growing sense of recognition?
It was as though she reminded me of someone I’d once known.

It was when this Sister came over to me after the meeting that I
realized she had been one of my teachers; a kind, encouraging soul
who’d once told me I should consider a career in Speech. My mind
suddenly saw her standing before me, smiling, saying "I had a little
dream about you last night. I dreamed you joined our Order here..."

Had the Lord been calling me when I was eighteen? Certainly. And I am
quite sure that if I’d stopped to listen, I would have been led to the
exact vocation He had ready for me: that of wife and mother. The fruit
of my marriage has been wonderful, and I do not doubt that it was my
call. I did err at eighteen, however, when I did not give God so much
as a chance to "speak."

As it was, He kept trying to get through, year after year, while my line stayed busy.

Thank God I finally stopped to listen, and to realize that I could belong to Him even though I wasn't living in a convent.

I agree with Kathleen, your writing and faith journey are stunningly beautiful. I am so thankful you "finally stopped to listen" and answered His call in your unique and wonderful way, and that you share the fruits of that ongoing conversion with us. I was riveted reading your story of "re-conversion." The paintings you choose are so inspiring too!! God Bless you always Nancy and your incredible writing from the heart and soul....

Oooooo, I'm SO glad you shared your story here. It's beautiful. Although my own story is different, in truth, there's much that's familiar... the calling, the drawing, the not letting go until I was ready to say yes to Him. I'm so glad for His faithfulness to us.

Thank you for writing this down for us... it's sweet like honey to my mouth and heart.Brendaxox

welcome!

by Nancy Shuman

'You are my letter,known and read by all men,written on your hearts.Clearly you are a letterwritten not with inkbut by the Spirit of the living God, not ontablets of stonebut on tablets of fleshin the heart...' 2 Corinthians 3:2